Smart placement rules

ABSTRACT

A smart placement module determines components of received medial data, such as medical reports and image montages, to forward to one or more secondary location, such as an EMR system, based on smart placement rules that are established by a user that receives the medical data, such as a referring doctor. Thus, the smart placement module decreases or removes the need for the receiving user to manually select and transfer certain medical data for storage at the EMR system. Accordingly, the receiving user, and other authorized EMR system users, may have prompt access to the medical data via their respective connections to the EMR system. In one embodiment, the smart placement module transmits a patient identification file that is usable by the receiving EMR system to allow the EMR system to associate received medical data with other data regarding a respective patient.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No.11/942,674, filed Nov. 19, 2007, entitled “SMART PLACEMENT RULES,” nowU.S. Pat. No. 7,953,614, which claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(e)to U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/867,071, filed Nov. 22, 2006,each of which are hereby expressly incorporated by reference in theirentirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The invention relates to the management and placement of medical data,and more particularly to the smart placement of received medical datawithin an Electronic Medical Records (EMR) system, for example.

2. Description of the Related Art

Medical data is increasingly being stored in the form of digitaldocuments that can be electronically transmitted and shared betweenmultiple computing devices. EMR systems store various types of medicaldata, such as images from x-rays and MRIs, montages of images, voiceclips, notes, reports, and other text, audio, and/or video from a widevariety of sources. EMR systems receive medical data from physicians orother medical practitioners, for example, that have generated and/orreceived the medical data from one or more imaging facilities. Thismedical data often needs to be viewed, manipulated, interpreted, and/orshared between multiple medical members in the same facility or membersin one or more distant facility. Accordingly, there is a need forimproved systems and methods for the smart placement of medical recordsso that collaboration among medical faculty can take place.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In one embodiment, a method of managing medical data received from atleast one medical imaging facility, the medical data comprising medicalimages and medical reports, comprises receiving data from a userindicating a first storage location of an EMR system for storing medicalimages and a second storage location of the EMR system for storingmedical reports received from the imaging facilities, receiving medicalimages and medical reports from at least one of the medical imagingfacilities via one or more networks, associating each of the receivedmedical images and medical reports with respective patients, andtransferring the medical images and the medical reports to the EMRsystem with information indicating the first and second storagelocations for the respective medical images and medical reports.

In one embodiment, a method of manipulating medical data associated witha patient comprises receiving first information from a user of a firstcomputer specifying medical data to be retrieved by the first computer,receiving instructions comprising an indication of a secondary storagelocation, receiving medical data associated with a patient in responseto matching the first information to certain attributes associated withthe medical data, and transferring at least some of the medical data tothe secondary storage location, wherein the secondary storage locationis configured to associate the transferred medical data with othermedical data associated with the patient so that the transferred medicaldata is accessible by users of the secondary storage system.

In one embodiment, a medical data management system comprises a storagedevice for storing received medical data associated with a patient andfor storing smart placement rules indicating one or more components ofmedical data to be transferred to an indicated secondary storagelocation, and a smart placement module for identifying one or morecomponents of the received medical data that are indicated in the smartplacement rules and forwarding a copy of the identified one or morecomponents to the secondary storage location.

In one embodiment, a method of forwarding medical data to a patientrecords system, the method comprises receiving rules from a user of acomputing system, the rules comprising criteria indicating whichcomponents of the medical data should be transmitted from a medicalimage storage device to the computing system and/or when the componentsshould be transmitted to the computing system, receiving a storagelocation from the user of the computing system indicating where themedical data is to be stored in a patient records system, attachinginformation to medical data received from the medical image storagedevice, the information indicating one or more storage locations in thepatient record system so that respective storage locations areassociated with different components of the received medical data, andtransmitting the received medical data and the attached information tothe patient records system.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1A is a block diagram of a computing system comprising a computingdevice in communication with a network and various networked devices.

FIG. 1B is a block diagram illustrating one embodiment of a computingsystem comprising a computing device in communication with the imagingdevice via the network.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating one embodiment of a method ofautomatically forwarding received medical data to one or morepredetermined locations based on smart placement rules.

FIG. 3 is one embodiment of a graphical user interface that may be usedto establish smart placement rules.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE CERTAIN EMBODIMENTS

Embodiments of the invention will now be described with reference to theaccompanying figures, wherein like numerals refer to like elementsthroughout. The terminology used in the description presented herein isnot intended to be interpreted in any limited or restrictive manner,simply because it is being utilized in conjunction with a detaileddescription of certain specific embodiments of the invention.Furthermore, embodiments of the invention may include several novelfeatures, no single one of which is solely responsible for its desirableattributes or which is essential to practicing the inventions hereindescribed.

As used herein, the terms “medical data,” “medical-related data,” and“medical records” are defined to include data in any format that isrelated to a patient. As non-limiting examples, the terms may include,but are not limited to, medical images, such as radiograph, computedtomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), Ultrasound (US),mammogram, positron emission tomography scan (PET), and nuclear scan(NM) images; montages of medical images; medical reports; voice clips,notes; and medical reports. Medical data may be stored in variousformats, such as PDF, JPEG, GIF, PNG, DOC, XLS, PPT, MP3, WAV, HTML,XML, and various other formats.

A “component” of medical data is a category or type of medical data. Forexample, components of medical data may include an image componentcomprising medical images and a report component comprising a writtenreport corresponding to the medical images. Components of medical datamay include, for example, images, montages, voice clips, notes, andreports.

FIG. 1A is a block diagram of a computing system 100A comprising acomputing device 105A in communication with a network 160 and variousnetworked devices. The computing system 100A may be used to implementcertain systems and methods described herein. Depending on theembodiment, the functionality described below with reference to certaincomponents and modules of the computing system 100A may be combined intofewer components and modules or further separated into additionalcomponents or modules.

The exemplary computing device 105 comprises a memory 130, such asrandom access memory (“RAM”) for temporary storage of information and aread only memory (“ROM”) for permanent storage of information, and amass storage device 120, such as a hard drive, diskette, or opticalmedia storage device. The mass storage device 120 may comprise one ormore hard disk drive, optical drive, networked drive, or somecombination of various digital storage systems. The computing device 105also comprises a central processing unit (CPU) 150 for computation.Typically, the modules of the computing device 105 are in datacommunication via one or more standards-based bus system. In differentembodiments of the present invention, the standards based bus systemcould be Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI), Microchannel, SCSI,Industrial Standard Architecture (ISA) and Extended ISA (EISA)architectures, for example.

The computing device 105 is generally controlled and coordinated byoperating system software, such as the Windows 95, 98, NT, 2000, XP,Vista, or other compatible operating systems. In Macintosh systems, theoperating system may be any available operating system, such as Mac OSX. In other embodiments, the computing device 105 may be controlled by aproprietary operating system. Conventional operating systems control andschedule computer processes for execution, perform memory management,provide file system, networking, and I/O services, and provide a userinterface, such as a graphical user interface (“GUI”), among otherthings.

The exemplary computing device 105A includes one or more of commonlyavailable input/output (I/O) devices and interfaces 110, such as akeyboard, mouse, touchpad, and printer. In one embodiment, the I/Odevices and interfaces 110 include one or more display devices, such asa monitor, that allows the visual presentation of data to a user. Moreparticularly, display devices provide for the presentation of GUIs,application software data, and multimedia presentations, for example.According to the systems and methods described below, medical images maybe stored on the computing device 105A and automatically transmitted toone or more EMR systems manipulated by the smart placement module 145based on one or more placement rules established by a user of thecomputing device 105A. The computing device 105 may also include one ormore multimedia devices 140, such as speakers, video cards, graphicsaccelerators, and microphones, for example.

In the embodiment of FIG. 1A, the I/O devices and interfaces 110 providea communication interface to various external devices. In the embodimentof FIG. 1A, the computing device 105A is in data communication with anetwork 160, such as a LAN, WAN, or the Internet, for example, via acommunication link 115. The network 160 may be coupled to variouscomputing devices and/or other electronic devices. In the exemplaryembodiment of FIG. 1A, the network 160 is in data communication with animaging device 170, an Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system 180, amass storage device 185, and a medical facility 190. Depending on theembodiment, the EMR system 180 may comprise proprietary medical recordmanagement software and/or one or more of various available third-partyEMR systems. In addition to the devices that are illustrated in FIG. 1A,the network 160 may facilitate communications with other computing,imaging, and storage devices.

The imaging device 170 may be any type of device that is capable ofacquiring medical images, such as MRI, x-ray, mammography, or CT scansystems. In one embodiment, the imaging device 170 is configured tostore images and data associated with images. In one embodiment, theimaging device 170 communicates with the computing device 105 via thenetwork 160, or one or more other wired and/or wireless networks, suchas a secure LAN, for example. In one embodiment, the image data isstored in Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (“DICOM”)format. The complete DICOM specifications, which may be found on theNational Electrical Manufactures Association Website at<medical.nema.org>. Also, NEMA PS 3—Digital Imaging and Communicationsin Medicine, 2004 ed., Global Engineering Documents, Englewood Colo.,2004, is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.

The exemplary EMR system 180 is configured to store digital medical dataso that doctors, medical staff, patients, and/or other authorizedpersonnel can effectively view and share the medical data. The EMRsystem 180 may provide medical data from multiple sources to thecomputing device 105 via the network 160. Likewise, medical data fromthe computing device 105 may be provided to other medical facilities,such as the medical facility 190 of FIG. 1A, via the EMR system 180.Depending on the embodiment, the medical facility 190 may include one ormore hospitals, clinics, doctor's offices, or any other facility thatgenerates and/or processes medical data. The medical facility 190 mayinclude one or more imaging devices, such as imaging devices thatgenerate the image types described above in the definition of medicaldata. In one embodiment, multiple computing devices, such as thecomputing device 105, may be housed at the medical facility 190.

In the embodiment of FIG. 1A, the smart placement module 145 isconfigured to forward medical data received by the computing device105A, such as from the imaging device 170 or the medical facility 190,to one or more EMR systems according to placement rules established by auser of the computing device 105. In one embodiment, medical data isreceived at the computing device 105 in response to matching of one ormore auto-pull rules with particular medical data and/or components ofthe medical data. For example, in an auto-pull system, either thecomputing device 105 or a remote server may be configured toperiodically select, based upon a user-defined schedule, medical datasatisfying the user-specific rules. The user may be authenticated withthe remote server in order to determine the user's rights to receivemedical data and the selected medical data may then be transmitted tothe computing device 105A so that it is locally available for theviewing physician, technician, or other authorized viewer. U.S. Pub. No.2006/0095423, published on May 4, 2006 to Reicher et al. titled “Systemsand Methods for Retrieval of Medical Data,” which is hereby incorporatedby reference in its entirety, describes various systems and methods forestablishing auto-pull rules for selectively transferring medical datato a computing device.

In one embodiment, the smart placement module 145 determines componentsof received medial data to forward to one or more secondary storagelocations, such as the EMR system 180 or a specific directory of a localstorage device, based on smart placement rules that are established byan authorized user of the computing device 105. Although the descriptionbelow refers primarily to an EMR system 180 as the secondary storagedevice, the systems and methods described herein are operable with anysuitable secondary storage device, whether local or remote to thecomputing device 105.

Through the automatic application of smart placement rules by the smartplacement module 145, the need for a user of the computing device 105 tomanually select and transfer components of medical data to one or moresecondary locations, such as the EMR system 180, is reduced or removed.Accordingly, the smart placement module 145 allows a user of thecomputing device 105, and other authorized computer users that are incommunication with the EMR system 180, to locate data regarding apatient in the EMR system 180. In one embodiment, the smart placementmodule 145 provides an interface for an authorized user to establishsmart placement rules that indicate what components of medical datashould be forwarded to one or more secondary storage locations. In oneembodiment, smart placement rules may also indicate storage locationsfor respective components of medical data, such as a directory on alocal storage device, a directory on a shared storage device, or afolder in an EMR system, for example. Depending on the embodiment, thesmart placement module 145 may be configured to copy the selectedcomponents of medical data (e.g., leaving a copy on the computing device105) or to move the selected components of medical data (e.g., notleaving a copy on the computing device 105) to the selected secondarystorage location. In one embodiment, the mass storage device 120 storesthe user-specific rules. A further description of the smart placementmodule 145 and its processes will be discussed below.

FIG. 1B is a block diagram illustrating one embodiment of a computingsystem 100B comprising a computing device 105B in communication with theimaging device 170 via the network 160. In the embodiment of FIG. 1B,the computing device 105B comprises a local version of the EMR system180. In this embodiment, the EMR system 180 may be used exclusively bythe computing device 105B, may be used by other devices coupled to thecomputing device 105B, such as via a secured local area network, and/ormay be accessed by any authorized devices that are in communication withthe network 160.

In the embodiment of FIG. 1B, an exemplary temporal flow of data isindicated by the circled numerals 1-3 and is described in further detailbelow. Depending on the embodiment, certain steps may be removed andadditional steps may be added.

In step one of FIG. 1B, the imaging device 170 transmits medical data tothe network 160, and the medical data, such as medical images, reports,and/or other medical information, is received and stored by thecomputing device 105B. In one embodiment, medical data is selected fortransmission to the computing device 105B as a result of matching one ormore auto-pull rules that are established by a user of the computingdevice 105B.

In step two, the smart placement module 145 of the computing device 105Bapplies smart placement rules to the received medical data. In oneembodiment, the smart placement rules indicate that certain componentsof medical data is to be copied and/or moved to a secondary storagelocation either on the computing device 105B, such as in a folder of theEMR system 180, or to another device across the network 160. Forexample, smart placement rules may indicate that received medical datais to be transferred to a selected EMR system and associated withrespective patient data on the EMR system.

In one embodiment, the smart placement rules indicate one or morecomponents of medical data that are to be transmitted to a selected oneor more destinations. For example, a user can establish placement rulesindicating that only textual reports are to be transmitted to a selectedEMR system, or the user can establish placement rules indicating thatall components of received medical data should be transmitted to theselected EMR.

In step three of FIG. 1B, the indicated components of the receivedmedical data are transmitted to the EMR system 180. In one embodiment,the transmitted components are associated with other medical data of therespective patient(s) at the EMR system 180. In such an embodiment, anauthorized user of the EMR system 180 may access the transmittedcomponents via the respective patient's inbox in the EMR system 180.Thus, in one embodiment the smart placement module 145 advantageouslyautomates a process of selecting medical data for transmission to theEMR system 180 so that the medical data may be associated with othermedical data associated with the patient at the EMR system 180.Additionally, the smart placement module 145 may be configured toautomatically apply smart placement rules when medical data is receivedat the computing device 105 so that components of the medical data arequickly availably to authorized users of the EMR system, without anyintervention by the user.

In one embodiment, the smart placement module 145 generates a tokencomprising information indicating one or more software applicationsassociated with components of medical data that are transmitted to theEMR system 180. In one embodiment, the smart placement module 145determines the appropriate text, graphic, audio, etc., viewer(s) thatmay be used to present respective data items that are transmitted to theEMR system 180. For example, if the retrieved medical data includesimage files, then the token sent by the smart placement module 145 tothe EMR system 180 may indicate a specific third-party software viewingapplication that the viewing system should launch in order to view theimage files. In one embodiment, the tokens may designate a class ofsoftware application so that the user's default application of a giventype of application may be selected when indicated by a token.

In one embodiment, the smart placement module 145 generates a patient IDfile that is transmitted with the indicated components to the EMR system180. The patient ID file comprises an indication of a patient name,examination date, medical record number, and/or social security number,for example, of a patient associated with the transmitted medical datacomponents. Thus, the patient ID file is usable by the EMR system 180 toplace the medical data components in locations associated with theappropriate patient, such as folders, directories, or inboxes associatedwith respective patients. In other embodiments, the patient ID file maycomprise additional information regarding a patient.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart 200 illustrating one embodiment of a method ofautomatically forwarding received medical data to one or morepredetermined locations based on smart placement rules. The method ofFIG. 2A may be initiated in response to receiving new medical data atthe computing device 105, such that the medical data is forwarded basedon the smart placement rules substantially immediately after beingreceived at the computing device 105. In other embodiments, the methodof FIG. 2A is user initiated and may operate on medical data that hasbeen stored on the computing devices or a networked device for anextended period of time. Depending on the embodiment, the flowchart ofFIG. 2 may comprise fewer or more blocks and the blocks may be performedin a different order than illustrated.

Beginning in block 210, smart placement rules are established formovement or copying of medical data components to one or more secondarystorage locations. In one embodiment, the smart placement rules comprisedefault system rules and/or user-specific rules for each user or groupof users. Depending on the embodiment, the smart placement rules mayinclude component criteria that must be matched by received medical datain order to trigger an associated smart placement action. For example, asmart placement rule may specify that only an image and report componentof medical data is to be transmitted to a particular EMR system. Thus,when new medical data is received, only the image and report componentsare transmitted to the EMR system. In one embodiment, the smartplacement rules indicated separate storage locations for respectivemedical data components, such as a first location for medical images anda second location for reports. Additionally, in some embodiments, thesmart placement rules indicate a format that medical data componentsshould be in prior to transferring to the EMR system, such as HL-7 textformat, or PDF format, for example.

In one embodiment, the smart placement rules may also include criteriaassociated with header data of certain medical data components, such astime of day and/or date that a component is received by the computingdevice 105, a referring physician's name, a radiologist name, an examtype, an exam modality, and various other attributes of a components. Inone embodiment, default system rules are applied to received medicaldata if user-specific rules have not been established. FIG. 3, which isdescribed in further detail below, illustrates an exemplary userinterfaces for establishing smart placement rules.

Moving to block 215, medical data is received at the computing device105. As noted above, the medical data may be received from any suitablecomputing device that is in communication with the computing device 105,such as via the network 160. As defined above, the medical data maycomprise one or more of multiple files of various formats and mayinclude various information regarding a patient. In one embodiment, themedical data is stored in the mass storage system 120 of the computingdevice 105.

Next, in decision block 220 the computing device 105 applies the smartplacement rules to the received medical data in order to determine whichcomponents of the medical data, if any, should be copied and/or moved toone or more local or remote secondary storage locations. If a smartplacement rule matches one or more components of the medical data, themethod continues to block 230. If no smart placement rules match withthe medical data, the method returns to block 210 where medical datafrom another exam, another imaging source, and/or associated withanother patient is received.

At block 230, the components of the medical data indicated by theplacement rules are selected for transmission to the location indicatedin the matching smart placement rule. As noted above, all components maybe transmitted to a single location, e.g., a folder on a local ornetworked storage device or a local or networked EMR system, or thesmart placement rules may indicate separate storage locations forrespective components of the medical data.

Moving to block 240, the computing device 105 transmits the selectedcomponents to the location or locations associated with the matchedsmart placement rules. As noted above, in one embodiment a patient IDfile indicating one or more attributes of the patient associated withthe medical data components is also transmitted to the indicatedsecondary location. The patient ID file may be used, for example, by theEMR system in associating the transmitted medical data components withother medical data of respective patients. In this embodiment, themedical data of the patient is quickly made available to authorizedusers of the EMR system by accessing the patient's records stored by theEMR system.

In one embodiment, the smart placement module 145 generates one or moretokens that are associated with specific components of the transmittedmedical data. The tokens comprise information regarding compatibleand/or preferred software applications that may be launched in order toview and/or hear an associated medical data component. For example, ifthe selected medical data comprises a series of CT scan images, a tokenmay be generated to indicate one or more software applications in whichthe CT images may be viewed. Likewise, a token indicating one or moresoftware application in which a textual report may be viewed may beassociated with a textual report component. In one embodiment, the EMRsystem 180 may display a link and/or icon associated with a token thatmay be selected by a user of the EMR system 180 in order to access thecorresponding medical data in an appropriate software application.Certain tokens may comprise executable software code that launches adesired software application and opens selected medical data componentsin the software application. For example, an authorized user of the EMRsystem 180, such as a user of the computing device 105 or anothercomputing device in communication with the network, may select a linkassociated with a token in order to invoke execution of the token, andsubsequent launching of an indicated software application and opening ofthe corresponding medical data.

In one embodiment, the EMR system comprises separate patient inboxeswherein some or all of the patient's medical records are stored. Ingeneral, a patient's inbox is a location and/or index of locations wherethe patient's medical data is stored. This method may increase privacyof the medical data for specific patients by only allowing the patient,the patient's doctor, and/or other authorized users to access thepatient's medical data.

FIG. 3 is one embodiment of a graphical user interface 300 that may beused to establish smart placement rules. Depending on the embodiment,the layout of the graphical user interface, the types of input fields,buttons, and checkboxes may be modified. The exemplary graphical userinterface 300 comprises a component selection pane 302 that allows auser of the computing device 105, for example, to indicate whichcomponents of received medical data should be forwarded to one or moreindicated secondary storage locations. In the embodiment of FIG. 3,check boxes for component types images, montages, voice clips, notes,and reports are provided, where a particular component is selected fortransferring to an indicated secondary location if the correspondingcheckbox is selected. In other embodiments, other controls may be usedin order to allow a user to select one or more components. In otherembodiments, fewer or additional components may be available forselection.

The exemplary user interface of FIG. 3 also comprises smart placementpane 305 that allow a user to select secondary storage locations forreport and/or montage components of medical data. In the embodiment ofFIG. 3, the smart placement pane 305 comprises a report copy button 310that may be selected to indicate that received medical reports should beautomatically transmitted to an EMR system, or other storage location,identified in field 315. Similarly, a montage copy button 320 may beselected in order to indicate that received montages should beautomatically transmitted to an EMR system, or other storage location,identified in field 325.

In one embodiment, the smart placement module detects an EMR system thatis used by the computing device and automatically populates fields 315,325 with an indication of the detected EMR system(s). Where multiple EMRsystems are detected, the text display fields 315, 325 may comprisedrop-down fields that allow the user to select one or more of the EMRsystems to which the medical data should be transmitted. In oneembodiment, the user is provided with a directory structure that may benavigated in order to locate and select an EMR system or another storagelocation. In one embodiment, after establishing the smart placementrules, such as using the interface of FIG. 3, when medical data isreceived by the computing device 105, the components of the medical dataindicated in the component selection pane 302 are automatically forwardto the locations indicated in the smart placement pane 305.

The exemplary smart placement pane 305 further comprises buttons 332,334, and 336 that allow the user to select a desired format for themedical data that is transmitted to the indicated EMR system. In theembodiment of FIG. 3A, HL-7 text format may be selected by selectingbutton 332 and PDF format may be selected by selecting button 334. Inone embodiment, when button 332 is selected, medical data is convertedinto the Health Level 7 standard format, which is a widely knownstandard and format for medical records, before transmitting to theselected EMR system. Similarly, when button 334 is selected, medicaldata is converted into one or more Adobe PDFs before transmitting to theselected EMR system. The smart placement pane 305 further comprises another button 336 that allows the user to select other formats for themedical data. In one embodiment, when the button 336 is selected,another user interface comprising additional data formats, such as DOCor RTF, for example, is presented to the user.

The foregoing description details certain embodiments of the invention.It will be appreciated, however, that no matter how detailed theforegoing appears in text, the invention can be practiced in many ways.For example, the above-described auto-retrieve may be performed on othertypes of images, in addition to medical images. For example, images ofcircuit boards, airplane wings, and satellite imagery may be analyzedusing the described systems. As is also stated above, it should be notedthat the use of particular terminology when describing certain featuresor aspects of the invention should not be taken to imply that theterminology is being re-defined herein to be restricted to including anyspecific characteristics of the features or aspects of the inventionwith which that terminology is associated. The scope of the inventionshould therefore be construed in accordance with the appended claims andany equivalents thereof.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method comprising: accessing, by a computingsystem, user-defined rules for storing medical data, wherein theuser-defined rules are defined by a user and the user-defined rulesindicate at least: which types of medical data should be transmittedfrom medical data storage devices to a secondary medical data storagesystem, wherein the types of medical data include at least one or moreof medical images or medical reports, and locations in the secondarymedical data storage system associated with respective types of medicaldata; for respective pieces of medical data: determining, by thecomputing system, based on the user-defined rules and type of the pieceof medical data, whether the piece of medical data should be transmittedto the secondary medical data storage system; and in response todetermining that the piece of medical data should be transmitted to thesecondary medical data storage system: generating information indicatinga location where the piece of medical data should be stored in thesecondary medical data storage system, the information comprising atoken including location data or location data that is added into thepiece of medical data; and transmitting the piece of medical data andthe generated information to the secondary medical data storage system.2. The method of claim 1, further comprising: wherein the token includesan indication of one or more software applications that are suitable forviewing the piece of medical data.
 3. The method of claim 1, furthercomprising for respective pieces of medical data or for respectivegroups of pieces of medical data each related to a common patient, thegenerated information indicates at least one of a patient name,examination date, medical record number, or social security number. 4.The method of claim 1, wherein the token includes an indication of aclass of software application that is suitable for viewing the piece ofmedical data.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein pieces of medical datacomprise one or more of images, montages, reports, audio, or notes. 6.The method of claim 1, wherein the secondary medical data storage systemcomprises an electronic medical records system, a storage device localto the user, or a storage device that is shared with multiple users. 7.The method of claim 1, wherein locations in the secondary medical datastorage system comprise respective folders, directories, or inboxes. 8.The method of claim 1, wherein locations in the secondary medical datastorage system comprise locations associated with specific patients. 9.The method of claim 1, wherein the method is initiated in response toreceiving medical data at the computing system.
 10. The method of claim1, wherein the user-defined rules indicate respective formats forvarious types of medical data.
 11. A computing system comprising: one ormore processors configured to execute instructions in order to cause thecomputing system to access user-defined rules for retrieving and storingmedical data, wherein the user-defined rules are defined by a user andthe user-defined rules indicate at least one or more types of medicaldata that should be transmitted to one or more secondary storage system,wherein the types of medical data include at least one or more ofmedical images or medical reports; and one or more secondary storagesystems to which respective of the one or more types of medical datashould be transmitted; for respective medical data, identifying, by thecomputer system, a component of the medical data included in the medicaldata; determining whether the identified component of the medical datashould be transmitted to one or more secondary storage systems based onthe user-defined rules and a type of the identified component of themedical data; and in response to determining that the identifiedcomponent of the medical data should be transmitted to one or moresecondary storage systems, transmitting the identified component of themedical data to a secondary storage system associated with the type ofthe identified component of medical data indicated in the user-definedrules.
 12. The computing system of claim 11, wherein the secondarystorage systems are selected from the group comprising an electronicmedical records system, a storage device local to the user, or a storagedevice that is shared with multiple users.
 13. The computing system ofclaim 11, wherein the user-defined rules indicate a first secondarystorage location for a first type of medical data and a second secondarystorage location for a second type of medical data.
 14. The computingsystem of claim 13, wherein the first secondary storage locationcomprises an electronic medical records system and the second secondarystorage location comprises one or more of a storage device local to theuser or a storage device that is shared with multiple users.
 15. Thecomputing system of claim 13, wherein the types of medical data includeone or more of medical images, montages, voice clips, notes, andreports.
 16. The computing system of claim 13, wherein the user-definedrules indicate one or more required attributes of components of medicaldata, wherein components of medical data are not transmitted to thecorresponding secondary storage system unless the component isassociated with the required attributes.
 17. The computing system ofclaim 16, wherein the required attributes indicate one or more of one ormore modalities, one or more acquisition sites, one or more examstatuses, one or more exam priorities, or a time period.
 18. Thecomputing system of claim 16, wherein the required attributes indicatethat only components of medical data that have not previously beenmarked as read should be transmitted to the corresponding one or moresecondary storage location.